A Weighty Issue

This is my home scale. Well, not the exact scale but a representative photo of the one in my bathroom. Mine is not that old, probably no more than four years. Every morning after my first cup of coffee and daily constitutional, I'll strip down for my shower and find out what kind of day it's going to be. Lately things have been looking not too bad, consistently around 195 lbs. depending on last night's meal and whether I had that second beer at the hockey game. I wish it was lower, but I'm slowly working on that.

This is the scale at my gym. Well, not the exact scale but a representative photo of the one in my gym. I weigh myself every other day (Mondays, Wednesdays, Fridays). There's no set time (morning, afternoon, night), but it's always before I start my exercise. The thing is this one is registering right around 210 lbs. Seriously, the gym scale is consistently 15 lbs. more than the home scale. 197 at home = 212 at the gym. How can that be? I can understand two scales differing by a few pounds, even up to five, but 15 lbs. consistently?

I have a theory, not a very solid one and certainly not based on fact or science (kind of like creationism), but it's a theory nonetheless. The scale in the gym is located in a locker room below ground level. Not deep, deep down but one floor below grade. My home bathroom scale is on the second floor. The extreme altitude shift between the two locations, all of about 30 feet, has altered the laws of physics and magically erases 15 pounds of nachos, Fat Tire, and years of under-activity every morning. Taking a look at the other side of the coin, the gym scale, being located significantly closer to the earth's core, burdens my otherwise healthy specimen with 15 pounds of excesses that I never got to enjoy.

The choice is yours to decide which scale is more accurate... but my drivers license lists 195.